Those Across the River

by Christopher Buehlman

But Papa wasn’t a mean drunk; just a sad, sleepy one. He didn’t hit much.

Oh, it was coming. The dream. When sleep finally admitted me to its parlor, it would show me something naughty.

Something had knocked the boy out of his daddy’s shoes. Miles limped off where no father wants to go: in the direction he knew his son had been dragged.

“You know the best word I got from all Marse’s books? Alas. That is a good word. Full of helplessness and beauty.

Perhaps the father and son-in-law would mount a ladder to the moon and carve just enough out of it so no one could call it full again.

Men who want revenge have no dignity. They have already died and sold everything.